I kept the anger out of my voice. Cole probably didn’t notice the effort it took, but Shelby would have been proud. There were lots of emotions swirling inside of me, but I wasn’t going to let him off the hook just because he decided, after sixteen years, to finally show up for his family.
Suddenly, my hands itched to do something. To move. I needed to be moving.
“I’ve got to go feed cows in the next corral.”
I wasn’t sure what I expected him to do, but to my surprise, he followed me.
“Listen,” he began. “I know you don’t want me here, and that’s completely on my head. But I’ve been talking with your mom. She’s ready for rehab, and she’s agreed to let me pay to move her back home. She’ll have to spend a few days at the rehab center to make sure she’s good, but then she’ll get to go home and have whatever she needs. I’ll take care of everything. I don’t want her being at home to be a burden to you.”
Icy daggers shot through my gut at his statement. My attempt at altruism was over. It had lasted a whole thirty seconds. Which, to be fair to me, was longer than I thought I could pull off. I’d just tell Shelby it didn’t work out. I turned toward him, fists clenched and ready for battle.
But before I could retort, he held up his hands, backtracking. To his credit, shame filled his face.
“No. I didn’t mean…I’m sorry. I know your mom would never be a burden to you. I just meant that by not having her at a facility with round-the-clock care, I didn’t want you to worry about her getting hurt at home or something. She’ll have therapists and home health care in and out of her house the whole time.”
My anger, somewhat reluctantly, abated as he continued. “I just thought she might be more comfortable at home. And she…gave me her approval.”
I picked up a bale of hay and dropped it into the manger, cutting the string holding it together in two stiff movements. She would be more comfortable at home. My mom hated hospitals. That was the part that I hated about all of this. Her meager insurance from the diner wouldn’t pay for it. They’d pay in part if it were a facility but not the expense of home health, as we’d learned recently.
“Sounds like you got it all figured out, then,” I said.
Cole moved to stand next to me, kicking the hay and spreading it out before the cows came in for their food.
“You’re gonna get those fancy boots dirty if you keep doing that,“ I remarked before lifting another bale and dropping it in the manger, farther down the line.
“It’s good for me. I’ve been going soft for a while now.”
I didn’t say anything, but we developed a system for him to spread the hay I was bringing to the manger. I didn’t need the help; in fact, I’d have preferred him not to be there at all, but it did cut my feeding time down by almost half. We finished up and stood, with shifting eyes and feet.
He cleared his throat. “Listen, Jake. I’m doing this for your mom, with or without your blessing. That’s between me and her. But I’d like your blessing all the same.”
I stared at him. He stared back, hands in his pockets and waiting. Here was a man whose actions had done nothing but cause me pain almost my entire life. Somewhere in my mind, I had built him up to be something selfish and evil. He had been the common enemy of my mom and me. A black hole in my life.
But seeing him now, that hole didn’t seem as big as it used to be. This giant of a man had shrunk in my eyes. Maybe it was the effect of getting older myself, but his physical presence felt remarkably less impressive. It was still him, but his hair was now speckled with gray, his face seemed tired, his shoulders slouched. And his eyes shone with regret.
I was tired too.
Tired of the hate.
Tired of this man holding such a negative weight in my life.
He was waiting for me to respond. When I finally found my voice, I said, “You don’t have my blessing. You haven’t earned that. But I am grateful to you for helping my mom be more comfortable.”
He held my gaze for a few seconds before he finally nodded. He then lifted a hand to wave at me before he climbed back into his truck and drove away.
I wasn’t at peace watching him drive away. I was learning that anger and hurt had sharp edges and jagged peaks that took time to smooth and round out. But I did feel lighter, and the path to peace didn’t feel as impossible as it once had.
The next afternoon,I sat by my mom’s hospital bed, watching her eat the split pea soup and stale bread the hospital offered her. I had an iron stomach, always had, but even I had trouble keeping my cool watching that go down.
“Mom, let me run down to Chad’s and get you something edible. You want a meatloaf sandwich?”
She made a face and took a sip. “I think Chad only keeps that on the menu for you. Besides, I can’t eat anything greasy. But it’s not that bad.” She put on a brave face, swallowed, and then promptly dry heaved.
“It smells like somebody already ate it and peed it out of their body.”
My mom had been about to take another bite before she shot me a look and set the bowl down.
“Jake Nancy Evans! Now that’s all I can smell.”
